Re-activation
by skyfire777
Summary: After the war, XCOM was reduced to conspiracy theories and urban myths. They did not exist in any shape or form. But they were far from gone. Now, after 50 years of rebuilding, humanity faces yet another threat. Now, after 50 years of preparations, XCOM stands ready to face that threat. Covert!XCOM. Rating subject to change
1. Intro

**A/N: **welp. decided to try my hand at a crossover. this has been bouncing around my head ever since i replayed enemy within but i felt like i couldn't do it justice. then i figured i might as well write it seeing as i need a distraction from the ruins of my real life. i'm honestly more than a little disappointed with how this one turned out but i just wanted to punt out the boring-ish intro bits. as always reviews and criticisms are encouraged.

* * *

_Name: Elizabeth D. Owens  
__Occupation: General of the 1st Battalion of the Human Allied Military  
Appearance: Pale white complexion, red hair-short, hazel eyes  
Psionic: Unknown  
Status: Pending recruitment_

* * *

Humanity was under attack again. And we were caught with our pants down _again._ For all the shiny new tech the Ethereals had left them, it couldn't negate the lack of training and know-how needed to fight zero gravity battles. At least the weapons they had were able to damage these new aliens and their ships from what she heard. She stood and looked out her window, stance disciplined yet relaxed. "Then again," she said to herself, "panicked and evacuating civilians are rarely a good source of intelligence." Her men were trying to sort out the evacuees from the Moon's mining facility, with little success. Then she heard the door to her office open behind her.

"General Elizabeth Owens?" a man said as he entered. Elizabeth turned to face the man, fixing him with a hard gaze. He was south-east Asian by her reckoning, judging from his black hair and caramel skin tone. He wore what appeared to be a military dress uniform, though it didn't resemble any uniform she was familiar with. He also carried a briefcase with what appeared to be a rather sophisticated lock. Some sort of black ops, then, she thought. "Who are you?" she asked with no preamble. The man began walking toward her in a measured pace and extended his hand out for a handshake once he was close enough. She took it. "I am David Malateo," he answered, "and I am here to recruit you into an organization."

She narrowed her eyes at that. They're definitely black ops, and so far underground that this guy can't say its name. She walked over to her desk and sat, back straight against the chair and hands before her on her desk. She motioned for David, if that was his real name, to sit in front of her. Once he was seated, she asked, "And what does your organization do?" He shifted slightly in his chair as if to find a more comfortable seating position, which he apparently found as he visibly relaxed a moment later. "We exist to combat any external potentially existential threats that present themselves to humanity, such as the Ethereals roughly 50 years ago and now the aliens invading us now," he said, his voice betraying the slightest hint of awe and little else.

If that was all there was to it then these people wouldn't go through the hassle of staying covert, she thought. A group dedicated to fighting aliens would have unanimous approval. "Why hide, then?" David briefly looked at the case that he held in his lap before looking back up at the general's piercing, almost unblinking, eyes. She did not miss his hesitation. "Our status as a covert organization allows us to bypass much of the bureaucracy of government agencies," he paused, "the lack of oversight gives us the speed necessary to conduct our operations." "Also much of our practices are… ethically questionable at best." She mulled over that last statement. A lot of what they did against the Ethereal army was some of the most reprehensible acts humanity has ever committed to other living beings and everyone was okay with it. She found it difficult to imagine a situation where someone would be worried about mistreating the aliens. Unless…

Unless he was talking about _humans_. If these people were committing serious crimes against humanity, then that would present a lot of problems to them. But what could they have been… "The super-humans," she muttered. She looked up at David who seemed to realize what she was getting at. "Those stories about soldiers with superpowers… that was your doing," she stated, "and you covered it up so well that nobody believes them." S. David met her gaze with a small smile on his face. "What did you do to them?" she demanded. His smile reduced somewhat and he averted his eyes for a moment before reestablishing eye contact. "I cannot tell you that." That was the nail in the coffin, then. Whatever they did, it was probably best that the public not know. Still, if those stories were true then this organization was capable of many things and were probably instrumental in the Ethereal War.

There was still the question of who was funding them, though. Then again, David definitely wouldn't tell her until she accepts. It also probably didn't matter much. Considering that these people could field teams of super soldiers while keeping everyone in the dark about it, their funders probably don't give a damn about what they do so long as they succeed. "Do you have any more questions, ma'am?" David asked, interrupting her train of thought. "What would you want from me?" Elizabeth asked. "Your performances in the simulations have been the most promising among all current high-ranking officers," he began, "your involvement in the counter-insurgency operations in China were also exemplary, as evidenced by your promotion to general after the fact. You have also shown a certain ruthlessness in your actions which plays into our methods. As such, you will be in charge of the organization as the over-arching commander. You will live on-site with limited outside contact and your pay will be forwarded to the person of your choosing."

She closed her eyes for a moment and took a deep breath. It was a tempting offer, though she was a little worried about their backers. "Who funds you?" "People." Figures, there was no way she was getting something out of this guy. She wasn't trained to be a spy, after all. Without bothering to open her eyes, she stood from her desk and walked toward the window again with practiced steps. She looked out onto the designated landing zone for the evacuees. It was chaos and the invasion hadn't even fully hit yet. Once it did, it was going to be this bad or worse everywhere. "My outside contact," Elizabeth tentatively asked, "how limited is it?" David seemed a little surprised at the sudden shift in her tone, but he let it slide. "You will be given an hour of phone calls per week. Non-cumulative." She sighed, it wasn't that different from normal she supposed.

She turned sharply to face David again. This time she stood with more trained discipline, the movement of her breath almost imperceptible, making her appear as if she was cast from steel. The sunlight filtering through the window behind her gave her a backlight enough to produce a slight silhouette. After a fraction of a second, she spoke with finality, "I accept." To David, the whole display was rather imposing and he caught himself feeling a little intimidated. Fortunately for him, he was able to re-school his features and smiled. He stood to meet her gaze (with some difficulty) and extended his arm for another handshake.

"Welcome to XCOM, Commander Owens."


	2. Chapter 1 - Part 1

**A/N: **ok so this one is gonna end VERY abruptly so sorry about that. been busy doing nothing and feeling bad. BUT i figured i owe the surprising amount of viewers i got _something _and so i'm birthing this chapter prematurely. tell me if getting updates like this is ok or if you'd prefer to wait a bit longer for a complete package.

i'll get around to writing 'part 2' later since i already know what i'm gonna write but not how to write it. probably

* * *

"Follow me, ma'am," David said as he motioned toward the door. Once they walked out the door, they were greeted with a mess of military and civilian forces rushing around, carrying various items from stacks of paper to medical supplies. David was quite amused by the fact that people seemed to put an unconscious effort into letting them pass, allowing them to walk a pretty straight path through the crowd. It only took them a few minutes to cross to the other end of the base where a sleek black car with a guard sporting Titan armor and a plasma rifle standing beside it. The guard reached over to open the car door and David got in. Elizabeth stopped for a moment outside, "Where are we going?"

"Ellington Field Base," the guard replied, "There's a Skyranger waiting for you there."

"I assume that this transport is going somewhere."

This time, David answered her question from inside the car, "We're heading to the XCOM Central base in the United Kingdom. We also have four other bases located in the United States, Philippines, Brazil, and Central Africa."

"And my belongings?"

"They're being transported to the base as we speak. You didn't have much, though we were a little surprised by the 1911 pistol you kept on your bedside table. Not a lot of people carry those nowadays."

She raised an eyebrow. "You broke into my house," she said, more of a statement than an inquiry.

"Only after you accepted."

She sighed, briefly wondering what she had gotten into. At least they were under her command now.

With that cleared up, she purposefully stepped into the car. The guard reached out to close the door, but Elizabeth beat her to it and closed the door herself.

The guard shrugged and got into the passenger seat, making the car tilt slightly. David nodded to the driver who had been making himself scarce until then, wordlessly telling him to drive. When he began driving, Elizabeth chose that moment to speak up. "Well? She said, "Are any of you going to introduce yourselves?" The driver looked at Elizabeth through the rear view mirror, presumably to get another look at the new commander. Satisfied, he returned his eyes toward the road. "Sorry ma'am," he apologized, "Agent Artyom Vorboyov. XCOM Intelligence. Was assigned to watch you about 6 months ago." Elizabeth 'hmmed' at that. That explains how they tracked her down and broke into her house so fast: they were nearby the whole time.

The new commander turned to look at the person sitting in the passenger seat who took that as a sign to start talking: "Corporal Cho Ji-Woo, ma'am. Former grunt in the Allied Military, specifically Korea."

"Do all of your operatives talk that little?" Elizabeth asked, presumably directing the question to David.

"Not all, but not talking is a valued skill in our organization."

Elizabeth nodded. She had to get used to working black ops, she supposed.

"As for me," David said as he gestured towards himself, "I will be acting as your second in command, managing XCOM's day-to-day operations as well as providing tactical support to our troops on non-critical, low risk missions."

"Low risk?"

"Low risk means we have intel," he answered, "high means none."

The commander raised her eyebrow at the statement, "Basically you send soldiers out on suicide missions."

"I was about to get to that actually," David said, "with the introductions out of the way, I was hoping to inform you more about our organization."

He pressed his thumb against the device on the briefcase, which then beeped and clicked open. He pulled out a folder with 'XCOM' scribbled on top and handed it to Elizabeth. "XCOM, formerly the Extra-terrestrial Combat Unit, was around for some time but wasn't fully activated until the Ethereals invaded," David stated while Elizabeth perused the file. "We're funded by the Council of Nations, though since every last nation on Earth is funding us now, the name seems moot."

Not to mention the fact that all those nations are 'uniting' under a single government, she thought. Doing that would require a significant amount time and effort in order to be even halfway competent. The Allied Military alone was a tangled mess of conflicting doctrines and incomprehensible ranks. That's what happens when you forcibly mash armies that have been following their own personal rulebooks for ages, after all. Still, that was the point of this 'XCOM' apparently: to do away with all that. And if this file was to be believed, they were VERY well funded and were allowed to do whatever they damn pleased so long as they get results. She could get behind that.

David took her silence as a cue to continue, "Once all existential threats are neutralized, XCOM will be deactivated, for lack of a better term. The Council would drastically cut our funding and most of our military assets decommissioned. Our research and development teams remain mostly intact, however, in order to continue their work on classified tech."

"Like your super soldiers," she mused out loud. Admittedly, she was more than a little curious about them.

David smiled, "Exactly."

He continued, "We mainly act as direct and indirect support to the main military forces; directly by sending our combat forces to secure and reinforce areas which the army otherwise cannot as well as executing high-risk but potentially vital operations. The nature of these missions dictate that our troops be deployed as soon as possible and not a second longer. Mission briefings are usually conducted as our forces are already en route to the mission site."

Ahh, that explains the lack of intel then. Trading operational safety for faster deployment. She wondered for a moment if all of XCOM was like this.

"As for indirect support, we research various new technologies and then disseminate our findings to the public if they are considered safe. All the plasma weapons and powered armors the Allied Military has originated from our labs, not to mention other civilian tech like the elerium generator."

"Wait," she said as she raised a hand to stop the man from talking for a moment. "This file tells me that you've had elerium based tech since the war. Care to explain why they only began appearing 20 years ago?"

David frowned at the question, "I've said that we only release our findings once we guarantee their safe use. Our research teams were having major concerns about radiation produced from the devices and the possible toxicity of elerium itself."

"And yet you used it anyway," Elizabeth stated. "I suppose it didn't end well for the guys who worked with it."

"Anyone assigned to experimental projects are informed of the potential risks and are allowed to back out before accepting the job."

"We're all volunteers, ma'am," the corporal interjected.

David nodded in agreement, "Yes, we are."

So all of XCOM really was like that.

Once she had finished reading the file, Elizabeth closed the folder with a snap and handed it back to David. He took it and handed her another from his briefcase. This time it was labelled 'MELD Projects.' She flipped it open and found what she had been looking for. "Genetic and biological modifications," she read out loud.

Her second in command looked at her from the corner of his eye while smirking coyly, "You've shown a particular interest in this, haven't you?"

"My grandfather loved telling the story of how he was rescued by men who could jump three stories high and healed severe wounds right before his eyes," she said as a hint of a smile began creeping on her face. "Of course mom would tell us that he was embellishing. Shows what she knew."

* * *

**A/N: **told you it would end abruptly. again, tell me if you guys prefer getting chopped up chapters (sort of) faster or waiting a bit longer. either way, expect valve time at random intervals. i don't trust myself enough to write regularly.


	3. Chapter 1 - Part 2

**A/N: **i wasn't planning on uploading anything today but i got bitten by the writing bug and so here it is.

* * *

"I see. Now then," he said as he cleared his throat, "MELD is a substance that allows for unparalleled biological and cybernetic modifications, giving us the ability to enhance our soldiers' combat capabilities. They can see farther, react quicker, move faster, heal injuries as you said, and that's not even the more exotic abilities they have."

"Such as?"

"We have one mod, dubbed the 'secondary heart' by the science team, which allows our soldiers to survive what would otherwise be fatal injuries. Provided that most of their vital organs remain mostly intact, of course. The adrenal response has also been improved, reducing the detrimental effects of a prolonged adrenaline surge, making it easier to control, and gives modded soldiers the ability to release adrenaline as a pheromone cloud which triggers and compounds with the adrenal response of those within the area of effect. There are more, but we'll cover them later."

Elizabeth hmmed as she turned another page on the file, this time it read 'Cybernetic Modifications.' She'd heard of the so-called cyborgs, of course, but they didn't appeal to her as much as the bio-modded soldiers since there were less stories about them and her grandfather may have made her slightly biased. Still, the idea of a walking tank appealed to her military mindset.

Sensing her change of interest, David continued, "While our genetic and biological enhancements have made our soldiers perform far better in the field, they are still infantry units and are limited accordingly. Our cybernetics programs, however, have allowed us to create a literal mechanized infantry unit: the armor and firepower of a tank with the versatility and mobility of infantry all contained within a single person."

Now THAT was something to consider. From what she could get from the file, these MEC troopers could shrug off small arms fire like it was nothing, though anything heavier than that could pose a problem. They could carry what would normally be vehicle-mounted weaponry while being able to strap on smaller 'subsystems' giving them a degree of tactical flexibility. Best of all were the jet propulsion system which gave MECs a limited ability to scale vertical obstacles. And from the size indicated, they could fit into most buildings. Jumping indoor tanks! Urban warfare would be revolutionized!

David could almost see the cogs turning in her head, so he left her to mull over the various implications of having super humans in her command. Eventually however, she looked at him and asked the question he'd been dreading to answer: "I've never heard of these technologies before. Does that mean these haven't been classified as safe yet?"

He sighed, taking the time to gather his thoughts. "Technically, we've already released parts of our research; mostly medical applications in gene therapy and prosthetics, among others. However, these were all just derivatives from our main research into MELD. We chose to withhold information, including the existence of, MELD primarily for two reasons."

He looked over to Elizabeth who was looking at him with unnerving intensity. "The first is that MELD is currently a finite resource. All of our MELD stores were acquired from the Ethereals and while substantial, we have yet to find a way to synthesize the material ourselves. We have more than enough to supply our operations, battlefield losses notwithstanding, but if we made the existence of MELD public-"

"It would evaporate in weeks," Elizabeth said.

"Months, actually," David said, "but the point still stands. We can't allow such a valuable resource to run dry just yet." Elizabeth nodded in understanding. "And the second reason?"

David massaged his forehead. He wasn't looking forward to explaining that. "There are multiple… complications regarding the extensive use of MELD enhancements. One or two basic modifications generally don't cause much problems, any more though caused a myriad of issues: increased susceptibility to psychosis, severe allergic reactions to most medications, and the occasional aggressive tumour growths."

'Aggressive' was putting it lightly, she thought. The pictures that were so generously provided for were downright gruesome. The least revolting one had something that was barely recognizable as an arm with what appeared to be bones and possibly teeth jutting out at odd angles. Elizabeth wasn't even sure how that was possible*. The rest just looked like random body parts melted together and then promptly exploded. At that moment, the reality of the valiant heroes who rescued her grandfather hit her hard. The price these people paid… And yet they could have been integral in humanity's victory against the Ethereals.

David forcefully cleared his throat, bringing her attention back to him. He was rather obviously trying to avoid looking at the pictures, so Elizabeth decided to flip the page. She wasn't keen on lingering on it any longer than she should, anyway. Once he noticed that the pictures were out of sight, David released a small sigh of relief. "Thankfully, the MEC troopers were spared from the more horrifying side effects. They're constantly on dialysis and other… artificial waste removal procedures, however."

"Why's that?"

"Most of their internal organs needed to be removed in order to make way for the supporting structures needed to interface with the cybersuits. If we didn't, anything more strenuous than walking slowly would rip their bodies apart."

Crimes against humanity, indeed.

"Of course these were the first things we sorted out after the war. The tumours are no longer as… intrusive and the allergic reactions have been mitigated. " he added quickly.

She nodded in understanding, albeit hesitantly. There were deaths to be expected in war, she knew that; violent and gruesome deaths even. But she always assumed those deaths occurred on the field at the hands of the enemy, not in their own labs. The price of victory was steep, or was it? If every one death prevented ten others, that would be considered an astounding success in any other situation. So why should it be different where they die?

No, there had to be a difference, she told herself.

She closed the file, not willing to read more of it. "David," she said, "your rather conflicted about this, aren't you? I would have thought that someone working in the command staff of a morally dubious organization would be less affected by this."

He sighed, gesturing to her to return the file to him. "I- I understand the motivations behind these actions but I don't agree with the extent they took it to," he said. "Perhaps I had to be there to truly comprehend the mentality of our predecessors."

Elizabeth turned her attention towards her armed escort. "Corporal, are you modded?" She nodded.

"How does it feel?"

Cho simply shrugged. "It burns when I pee."

Both David and Elizabeth's eyes widened in surprise. Clearly neither of them was expecting that sort of answer. Elizabeth allowed a small smile spread on her face while David let out an amused chuckle.

With the air cleared up, David reached back into his briefcase and retrieved a third folder. Curiously, this one was unmarked. "Commander, what I am about to show you is XCOM's greatest secret. There's no telling what could happen if anyone outside of our influence found out about this."

Now Elizabeth was intrigued, even more so than before. What could possibly be worse than those experiments?

"We have-"

"We're here."

The driver had cut off whatever David was about to say. Elizabeth looked out of her window and out onto the air-and-space port. In the middle of it was an unmarked Skyranger VTOL with the engines already running and ready to leave in a split second. "Seems like we'll have to continue our conversation in the plane," David said.

She nodded. At least she'll have some in-flight entertainment.

* * *

*It totally is. They're called teratomas and they are disgusting. I mean, REALLY fucking disgusting. One woman had one of these in her ovaries and you know what was in it? An eyeball, 'various internal organs,' and a head. An honest-to-god whole human head, brain and everything. IN HER OVARIES.

* * *

**A/N: **fyi, im gonna go on a trip for a few days so i expect a delay. then again, this has been my most successful fic so far and i've been pretty motivated to keep writing it as a result so who knows?


	4. Chapter 1 - Part 3

**A/N: **so this one took way longer than i thought for a couple reasons. one is that i found this bit to be slightly more difficult to write than i initially thought. two, i'm trying to get my ass back into college and fuck me i gotta relearn 4 years of high school in a few months. i got no private teachers/tutors coz there's no demand for them at the moment (a recent change in my country's education system means nobody's graduating for a few years). i got none of my old textbooks and notebooks since i got rid of them YEARS ago. basically, i've been bashing my head against my desk for days on end. and now, my laptop decided it hates me and just uninstalled a LOT of my drivers because i had the audacity to update my OS from the shitty windows 8 to the equally shitty windows 8.1 and for some reason, it won't allow me to reinstall any of those drivers (errors keep coming up every time i try). so yea, i haven't been doing so hot

thankfully my anti-depressants and monthly therapy actually seems to be working as i haven't been under this much stress without snapping in... fuck i don't know how long. feels good in a bad sort of way.

* * *

Elizabeth, David, and Cho all boarded the VTOL while Artyom remained on the ground. "Intelligence agents rarely show up in our bases," David explained, "they're more useful on the field where they can actively gather intel on a moment's notice."

Once they were safely strapped in, Elizabeth took the file supposedly holding XCOM's biggest secret. To say that she was confused when she opened it would be an understatement.

"Psionics," she said, not bothering to mask her disbelief. To her, this was absurd; unnecessarily so… which probably meant that they weren't messing around. She closed her eyes and massaged her forehead in an attempt to reconcile what she knew and what she was now presented with.

"I understand if you're having a hard time accepting this," David said, "but it's definitely real." The line sounded practiced to Elizabeth, probably was. Didn't make believing it any easier, though. "Perhaps a demonstration would help?" he asked.

A few deep breaths later and she nodded. If it was real, then she'd have to know about it in order to exploit it. If it was bullshit, then she can move on and forget about it. Or they could end up hijacking her mind and use her as a puppet, in which case there was probably not much she could do to stop it.

That's when she was hit with a rather bad headache, though not bad enough that she couldn't ignore it. Under normal circumstances she would have, but nothing about this situation was normal, so she paid extra attention to it. It felt different from the usual migraines she got from over-working or from lack of sleep. It felt… off somehow, forced. She looked at David, whose face was contorted in what would have been humorous if it wasn't for the implications it provided.

When he finally relaxed and loosed a breath he was apparently holding, her headache immediately disappeared. That was damning evidence in her book. "That was you, wasn't it?" she asked.

David flashed a tired smile. "Yes."

"Impressive," she said. And she meant it; it wasn't every day that you find someone who could literally give you a headache. "But if that's all your psionics can do then there really isn't much to work with."

"I'm only psionic in name only, really," he replied, "that's about the extent of what I can do. The majority of the psions we have on hand can do only this much, unfortunately."

"And the ones who can do more?"

"They can do a whole lot more," he said. "The specifics are in the file but they can induce a myriad of emotions, shift perceptions, and cause incapacitating phantom pains. The more adept individuals can even temporarily seize control of someone's mind. Not to mention the Progenies."

Elizabeth was about to ask about what a 'progeny' was but David beat her to it. "A Progeny is a psion with vastly increased capabilities. To date, only one has been found and according to the records, she was able to mind-control no less than 50 people from across the globe. Unfortunately, she died in the assault on the Temple Ship."

All this was, quite literally, very unbelievable. Still, lying at this point served no conceivable purpose, therefore unlikely. And David DID allegedly give her a headache. It was quite terrifying, however, to consider that these people had access to quick and easy brainwashing.

Though the file she had made it rather clear that 'easy' was debatable. Out of the hundreds of combat personnel XCOM had, only 1 in every 5 were psionic. Of that number, only a paltry 12, designated as QUEENS, had abilities that could make a tangible effect on the field. And with the combined lack of concrete knowledge and experience, they didn't even have experts to teach the troops how to use their abilities. This led to each individual QUEEN to lean towards one aspect or another. QUEEN-6, for example, specialized in spreading fear but was found deficient in 'fraying.' Elizabeth sighed. She'd have to deploy them individually attached to proper squads as force multipliers while ensuring that battlefield conditions matched their abilities. It added more complexity, which meant more points of failure. Not to mention that replacing these units would be incredibly difficult and unreliable. Speaking of which…

"How do you identify a psionic?" she asked.

"We screen everyone that joins, which takes about an hour. However if you test positive, you have to undergo a procedure to… activate your abilities which can take a few days," he answered.

Seemed reasonable, but if she were in charge (which she was, she reminded herself), she'd find a way to test every last living human for psionics as they would immediately be pegged as VIPs. That goes double for Progenies. She'll get to it after this invasion was done, though. But then if the aliens' objective was the psionics, then that would make finding them her priority. She shook her head. Right now her priority was figuring out was the aliens' objective WAS, how they fight, and how to fight them. She'll work on the rest later when things were less unclear or more desperate.

There was still one issue that demanded her attention ever since David's demonstration, though. "David," she called, "if I can't even be sure if my thoughts are my own, how can I trust you?"

It was a pointless question, she knew. There was no turning back now and a commander was much easier to replace as compared to the other assets they had. She needed peace of mind, though.

David's answer did nothing to assuage her doubts. He let out an amused huff and replied, "If you're asking about trust, you won't like what's coming next."

Elizabeth braced herself. Clearly this was going to be unpleasant.

"Do you recall those biological modifications I refrained from discussing?" he said. She nodded. "Well once we confirmed the existence of psionics, the commander at the time looked for a way to resist any mental assaults. It was possible to shrug off psionic attacks through force of will, but this was insufficient for rather obvious reasons. A more reliable and permanent defence was needed."

She really didn't like where this was going.

"Fortunately, our science team came up with a solution in modifying our brain in such a way that would make psionic attacks a lot more difficult, knocking you unconscious if an attack was particularly strong. It also could potentially 'reflect' those attacks, causing pain-"

She held up her hand to stop him from talking, which he politely did. "You want to _modify my brain?_ You're not garnering a lot of good will here, David."

"Well, it would make controlling your mind that much more difficult…"

"In other words," she said slowly, "your way of assuring me that I can trust you requires that I trust you even more."

"I- well I actually thought of it that way."

"Can I even opt out of it?"

David was looking a little flustered. "Well- no, you can't. If you do, you would be considered compromised and executed."

So much for being a volunteer. It made sense to her, though, and she hated that. Like she thought, there really was no point in asking that question aside from some assurances that didn't assure her at all.

"Can I take your silence as a vote of confidence, ma'am?" David asked.

She huffed and handed him back the file. "Let's just get to where we're going."

The rest of the flight was spent in relative silence.

* * *

**A/N:** the next chapter will hopefully be longer, though the last 3 'chapters' was supposed to be one long one anyway. also, we're gonna meet the science and engineering heads next. i've been dying to try and write those guys ever since i started writing this. i'm a bit worried that elizabeth is gonna come out as a flat character as the story goes on, but i'll deal with that when i start to get complaints/criticisms stating that. and as always, review my shit.


	5. Chapter 2

**A/N: **college applications suck. taxes suck. family sucks. everything sucks. but hey, everythings fucked up enough that i can afford to write again. silver linings and whatnot. i also vaguely remember telling someone that there was gonna be a bit of action this time. well there isnt. probably gonna be in the next update instead. also gonna merge chapter one after i sleep.

* * *

Elizabeth felt the plane start to slow down and assumed that they had reached their destination. The sound of the engines starting to echo told her that they had entered a chamber, most likely a hangar. Once the plane jolted slightly as it came to a stop on the ground, she stood up, followed by the rest of the passengers. As if in cue, the large door of the Skyranger opened up and the occupants strode out into XCOM Central.

"If you'll excuse me ma'am, I'll be returning to the barracks," Cho said.

Elizabeth nodded and the corporal saluted before walking away. "David, if all of your personnel are as disciplined as the corporal was, I could get used to this very easily."

Her aide smiled weakly, "Some of us are less tactful than others, but rest assured that we are all highly competent and professional."

She was a bit suspicious of that last statement, more on the way he said it than what he said. But she supposed that, considering all the things this organization did, a few eccentricities could be tolerated. As long as those eccentricities don't interfere with protocol then it should be fine.

"In any case, we should head to the situation room where the rest of the people who report directly to you should be waiting after which you'll be given a proper tour of the facility and then you'll undergo the, ahh, surgery," David said.

The commander nodded and allowed him to lead her down a series of drab steel corridors teeming with people rushing this way and that. She couldn't help but notice that there were more people out of uniform than there were in uniform, though some were wearing hard hats and lab coas. Civilian assets perhaps? In any case, a few of them would give a brief greeting to David when they passed and he would try to respond in kind, though they tended to be long gone before he could do so.

"The first person you'll be meeting is Dr. Edmund Oort, head of our research department," David said, "Currently age 49, has doctorate degrees in biophysics and neuroscience, and was studying to earn an MD before we recruited him 5 years ago."

"I suppose that degree in neuroscience helps your psychic program quite a bit."

"Psionics," David corrected, "But yes, though his contributions were fairly limited since there wasn't much he could do that we haven't done already. Still, he helped create a few ingenious exercises to train our psions, the most popular of which is the paintball exercise."

"Oh?" Elizabeth asked with curiosity clearly apparent in her voice.

"It's the same as regular paintball except the arena lacks any cover whatsoever and team members are not allowed to speak to one another. Each team is led by one psion and orders are relayed via psionics. In order to avoid getting shot, one must shift the perceptions of the opposing team while simultaneously resisting their attempts at doing the same to your team.

It's fantastic training for when our psions are deployed while our scientists can record whatever they wish while our troops have a bit of fun."

"Sounds interesting, I would like to watch a match soon."

David laughed, "It's really not that interesting, ma'am. Just a bunch of humanity's most elite soldiers constantly shooting three feet off target."

Elizabeth couldn't help but smile at that, "Regardless, I still wish to spectate a match when possible." Interesting or not, it would be best to see the capabilities of the new troops she had, especially since they were in a class of their own. "In fact, I want a demonstration of the capabilities of your MELD enhanced troops. I need to know what I have to work with, after all."

"I'll set one up when I can," he said.

They stopped in front of an elevator, though were it not for the label, Elizabeth would have thought the heavy duty blast doors led to something else. David pressed his palm against a biometric scanner, opening the surprisingly empty elevator considering the flurry of activity going on around them. An exclusive elevator for command staff, perhaps. Fancy.

Once they were inside and moving, David resumed talking, "The next man you'll be meeting is the head of our engineering department, Mr. John Hailey, age 32."

"Just mister?"

"He came recommended from multiple people, Dr. Oort included. We picked him up a year ago before he could complete his thesis work in physics, I believe. In fact it was his thesis work that made Dr. Oort recommend him. Apparently he planned on creating a device which would force volcanic eruptions anywhere on earth. All our experts agree that it would work if we built one."

Before she could ask, David answered, "He enjoys challenges and when he can't find one, he makes one up for himself. Usually in the form of some pointless doomsday machine."

"Are you sure it's safe to appoint such an unstable man to a command position?" Elizabeth replied.

David nodded, "As far as we can tell, he's perfectly sane and despite what you might think, he has an exceptional work ethic. He says time constraints and such are simply other ways he could challenge himself in."

Elizabeth smiled, "Is this what you meant by 'less tactful' personnel?"

David smiled back, "More or less."

The elevator pinged to signal their arrival with a helpful screen showing that they were at the situation room. Inside was a giant wall-sized screen displaying a map of the world overlaid with various dots, circles, and arrows of varying colors and sizes. Situated at the center was a fairly large table with four chairs, two of which were occupied. A few papers and a datapad were strewn in between them.

"Look," the younger one with a hard hat said, "The designs of the ships that attacked the moon were too varied to be from a single unified culture. I say we're dealing with another multi-species conglomerate."

The older man in a lab coat looked up from his datapad to address his companion, "I'm not saying you're wrong, I simply find it hard to believe that there are more than one multi-species civilizations out-" his datapad interrupted him when it beeped, drawing his attention to it. "Nevermind, I just received a copy of the surveillance footage and survivor testimonies. Turns out we're dealing with at least 3 different species."

The younger one slammed his hand down on the table before raising a fist into the air, his blue eyes gleaming with victory. "Fucking _called it._"

His colleague sighed, massaging the bridge of his nose which pushed his glasses slightly upward. "Yes, yes. You win."

David coughed, bringing the attention of the two arguing men to him. "Gentlemen, this is Commander Elizabeth Owens, XCOM's new overall commander."

"Commander," the lab coat said as he walked over to Elizabeth with his hand stretched out for a handshake. "I am Dr. Edmund-"

"Dr. Oort, yes," Elizabeth interrupted as she shook his hand. "David told me about you. You have quite the resume."

Dr. Oort smiled, "What can I say? I enjoy the pursuit of knowledge."

Elizabeth turned to face the other occupant who opted to remain seated. "And you must be John Hailey."

"Sup."

Dr. Oort glared at him. "_John. _At least greet your new _boss_ properly."

John sighed as he got up, "Fine." He crossed the room dejectedly but as soon as he was in front of the commander, he immediately began sporting a winning smile. He took Elizabeth's hand and gave it a firm, practiced shake. "It's pleasure to meet you, commander."

She fixed him with a withering look. David wasn't joking about the lack of tact. David and Dr. Oort, meanwhile, looked like they either wanted to hide their faces in shame or to slit John's throat.

John, on the other hand, was growing increasingly nervous as he slowly began realizing that the woman who was staring him down and refusing to let go of his hand could very easily order his execution. "Mr. Hailey," she said, "You are in a military operation now under MY command and I do NOT tolerate insubordinate behaviour. However, due to you civilian status and some assurances from Mr. Malateo of your reliability, I am willing to look the other way this time. I strongly advise you not to push your luck."

The moment she released his hand, he snapped to attention making a point to avoid her gaze. "Y-yes ma'am."

"Good," she said, "Now, I overheard that we've received some data from the moon attack?"

Dr. Oort nodded, "Yes ma'am. We have security footage from the base, transcripts of survivor testimonies, and some basic combat data from the space battle. I've sent copies to the labs for analysis."

"Then we'll do a quick briefing now while we're all here," she replied. "The tour can wait and I'm certain that your mandatory brain surgery will put me out of commission for a while. I'd rather we get this out of the way now so that I can issue a few standing orders."

They moved to take their places around the table. Elizabeth took the seat directly facing the screen, while David and Dr. Oort took the seats to her right and left respectively. Seeing that there was only one chair left which was directly across Elizabeth, John took it, much to his discomfort.

Once they were all properly seated, Elizabeth spoke, "Let's start with their ships. Mr. Hailey, you said earlier that they varied in design. Can you expound on that?"

"Wha- I- yea I guess I- I mean, yes ma'am" John stuttered. Dr. Oort tapped his datapad a few times, which apparently brought up rough schematics of the alien ships on the big screen. He motioned for John to turn around and face the display. John muttered a silent thanks to the doctor and got up to properly see the screen. He seemed to briefly consider moving his chair to the side before deciding against it and remained standing.

Elizabeth made a mental note to see if she could redesign the table so that everyone could face the screen at the same time.

"Right, so first we were attacked by about 10, uhh, individual ships. They seemed to teleport in but a bunch of dudes- I mean- a few observatories saw the ships near Pluto _after_ they arrived on the moon, which means that they have some kind of faster than light travel."

"As for their differences, I noted two main ones. First are their sizes which range from 100-ish meters to about 600. Second are the aesthetics of their structure. It's not that hard to guess that these stingray… things were designed by a very different person from the di- _pseudo-cylindrical _shaped ones. Furthermore, ships of the same sizes but different designs were, as far as we can tell, operating in a similar manner. Makes me think that they classify ships based primarily on their size regardless of who built it."

"So?" David asked, "Classification by size is hardly critical information."

"I think the point he's making is that we're most likely dealing with more than one culture," answered Dr. Oort.

"The Ethereals were like that too, weren't they?"

The doctor shook his head, "They were multiple races but they were all one single entity ruled by the Ethereals. All their ships and equipment more or less shared the same design philosophies. This time, however, it looks like different species with different cultures, and possibly with different governing bodies, are working in tandem."

John pointed at him, "What he said."

Elizabeth sighed, "Right now this is all irrelevant speculation. What do we know about their weapons and defences and how are we compared to them?"

"From what we could tell, their main guns are all forward facing kinetic weapons and a lot more powerful than they look, but they had to maneuver the whole ship to shoot things with it so I'm guessing they're fixed into position," John replied, seemingly more composed than before, "They blew up most of the surface to orbit guns and a bunch of Firestorms when they dropped in."

"So the moon was left defenceless, then," she mused.

"Not entirely," David said, who was now perusing his own datapad. "One surface based fusion lance, four Firestorms equipped with their own fusion lances, and one missile battery were able to avoid the initial attack. The groundside lance was able to damage one large ship, but was immediately bombarded after that. The Firestorms further damaged that ship until it withdrew and they were able to damage another before they were shot down, allegedly by laser point defences. The missile batteries were of dubious help as most of the missiles were shot down by the same point defences, though the ones that did get through caused significant damage to one of the smaller ships."

Elizabeth sighed again, "Those were fighters designed to take on ships the size of a city. How were they shot down so quickly?"

John answered, "I think its coz the alien ships were moving really weirdly."

"How so?" David asked.

"Well they could change orbits waay too trivially. And since all our knowledge on space combat relies on calculating enemy orbits, our pilots probably had no clue on what the fuck the aliens were doing."

Realizing that he had just acted a bit too casual, John looked towards Elizabeth, hoping that she didn't notice. What he saw was the leader of the biggest and most powerful black ops organization boring holes into his skull with her eyes. All he could manage was a weak smile and a meek "Sorry, ma'am."

Satisfied, Elizabeth addressed the whole room, "Is there anything else about the enemy ships that we know?"

"Not until we get more data, ma'am," John replied.

"Then let's move on," she said, "What about the aliens themselves?"

Dr. Oort tapped his datapad once again, replacing the ship schematics with a series of still images captured from the security cameras on the moon base. They depicted various groups of humanoid aliens in full armor, enough to hide plenty of defining features but not enough to differentiate them from humans. One kind of alien seemed to be fine without any armor, however.

While the rest were focused on the screen, John took the opportunity to angle his chair toward the screen and sit down, relieved.

"I have to say that they look a lot more human than any of the Ethereal races did," he said.

After scrutinizing the images for a moment, Elizabeth saw something interesting. "That image on the top right, can you expand that?"

A second later the image had expanded to fill most of the screen. It showed one of the aliens which looked eerily like a human female in yellow armor with its arm extended outward. What caught Elizabeth's eye, however, was the distinct bluish haze around her.

"Is she… glowing?" John asked.

"Ahh yes," Dr. Oort replied, "multiple eye witnesses reported that the ones which look very similar to human women were capable of some sort of telekinesis while they were glowing."

David frowned. "Doc, is it psionics?" he asked with worry.

The doctor considered the question for a moment before saying, "I don't think we should rule that possibility out just yet but it certainly is more physical than psionics and psions pointedly don't glow while using their abilities."

"That is quite worrying…" Elizabeth thought aloud. First psychics and now telekinetics. What would the galaxy throw at them next? "Do we know more about their abilities?"

"Not right now, no," said the doctor, "All we know is that they glow before they use their powers."

"Then what else do we know?"

The image on the screen shrank back into the corner as different pictures came up. This time they were cropped images of the various hostile alien species, one alien per image.

The first one showed the unarmoured alien which had claws, digitrade legs, and wrinkled skin. Its head was topped with fleshy spikes and had three holes on their foreheads. What stood out for Elizabeth, though, was the mouth which was lined with an innumerable number of spindle-like teeth.

The next was the aforementioned human female-like alien, followed by another alien which looked like a human male.

The fourth alien had what looked like an elongated helmet stretching towards its back. Its chestpiece looked very bulky when compared to the rest of its body. It had three fingers per hand and also had digitrade legs.

The fifth and final image had a very lanky-looking humanoid with a head that was too tall to be human, or at least the helmet was. The torso was also too small for a human's. Like the previous one, it had three fingers per hand and digitrade legs.

"As I've said before," Dr. Oort continued, "There are at least 3 different species based on their body shapes, though there could easily be more since their armors conceal a lot. I'm basing my assumptions on the fact that the last two pairs are male and female versions of 2 different species since their body types are fairly similar, and considering the degree of sexual dimorphism of some terrestrial species, I believe that this is a valid hypothesis."

"So far, the ones we need to watch out for the most are the telekinetics and the unarmoured aliens. The telekinetics are a threat for obvious reasons while the unarmoured ones are absurdly durable according to the survivors. They were reportedly able to survive multiple plasma rounds to the abdomen and were able to recover from otherwise severely crippling wounds within minutes."

Elizabeth was about to comment of the sheer absurdity of that until, once again, she remembered that she was now part of a world with psychics and telekinesis. Instead, she decided to ask about things she could wrap her head around. "What about their weapons and armor?"

This time, it was David who answered, who turned out to have been studying the testimonies and videos on his own pad. "Plasma appears to have less of an effect than desired. Instead of clinging to targets and burning them, it seems as if the plasma just splashes off of them, greatly reducing the amount of damage it theoretically should. As for why that happens…"

"It might be some kind of force field or barrier," John contributed. "It wouldn't be too far-fetched, all things considered, and there were a few reports of the fusion lances detonating a few meters away from the hull of the alien ships. Can't really confirm it though since all four pilots might as well be dead right now."

David just nodded, not really wanting to argue with the idea. "As for their weapons, they're using kinetic weapons, of all things. Powerful ones, though, and I didn't see any of them reload once in any of the videos."

Elizabeth nodded in understanding. Frankly, this was more than she expected. She thought she'd be dealing with a 'conventional' war with none of the fantastical elements she was now confronted with. But officer school had taught her to take what she got and run with it. This was probably not what her teachers had in mind when they told it to her, but it was more relevant now than ever before.

"Alright, so is this all we have at the moment?" she asked. When nobody responded, she took that as a positive.

"Ok then. Right now we know precious little about our enemies. That is unacceptable. We need to know what their goals and priorities are and then deny it from them." Especially since we have absolutely no way of attacking them, Elizabeth thought. "Try to figure out their preferred tactics as well as modes of communication. The sooner we're able to interrogate one of them, the better."

"If I may, Commander," David said, "we already have a way of interrogating aliens without having to talk to them. It's fairly limited, but it's better than nothing."

Elizabeth nodded. Whatever they did to accomplish that seemed complicated and she's had enough complicated for the day. "Then do it. While we're doing that, I want you to prioritize defending population centers first, if you can afford to do so. Our population is still a long way from pre-war levels so having it plummet any further would be a bad idea. Mr. Malateo, do you think our psionic troops will be able to tell if the telekinetics are psionic based or not?"

David paused for a moment. "I suppose it won't hurt to try. I'll order one of the Queens out with a squad first chance I get."

"Order the Queen to stay back and not expose themselves at all costs. Whether or not our enemies have psionics, I don't want to tip our hand just yet. They made that mistake, showing us their abilities, let's not follow their footsteps," Elizabeth added.

David replied with a snappy "Yes, ma'am."

"Mr. Hailey." John jumped at the mention of his name. "Force fields or not, our weapons are less effective than I want them to be. Find a way around it. Also, since missiles are apparently inefficient against these bastards, I need you to develop a new surface to orbit weapon that works in atmosphere. I also need you to improve our fighters in any way you can since they're our best and only bet at challenging them in space right now."

"Aye-aye, ma'am!" he replied, slightly less scared and a lot more excited as ideas raced through his head.

Finally, she turned to Dr. Oort, "Doctor, I don't think I need to tell you to perform extensive autopsies on as many corpses as we can recover. Prioritize the telekinetics. Also, see if you can somehow find a way to communicate with the aliens without… doing whatever it is you do to interrogate them" She paused before adding, "And try to help Mr. Hailey with his projects."

Dr. Oort smiled as he was tapping away at his pad. "I was already planning on doing all that, Commander. Although," he said, "my teams have been developing an improved version of the medical spray. It's near completion and it won't take too much effort to finish it."

"Do it," the Commander said. Keeping soldiers alive was always a good thing.

"That should be all, then. Gentlemen, dismissed." As she stood from her chair, she turned towards her aide. "Now then, David, I believe you owe me a tour of the premises.


End file.
